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  • Bill Purse: The PrintMusic! Primer—Mastering the Art of Music Notation with Finale PrintMusic!
  • Margaret Cahill
Bill Purse: The PrintMusic! Primer—Mastering the Art of Music Notation with Finale PrintMusic! Softcover, 2003, ISBN 0-87930-754-4, 272 pages, illustrated, bibliography, index, US$ 69.95; Backbeat Books, 600 Harrison Street, San Francisco, CA 94107 USA; telephone (+1) 415-947-6615; fax (+1) 415-947-6015; electronic mail books@musicplayer.com; Web www.backbeatbooks.com/.

The PrintMusic! Primer is a guide to using the PrintMusic! notation software from MakeMusic!, the producers of the Finale family of notation applications. These applications range from the free eight-stave NotePad package to the well-known Finale. PrintMusic! is an entry level notation application that allows users to prepare scores and parts for printing and publication on the Web, along with producing MIDI files of these scores. A number of features are included to help the user input notation, including the ability to scan in music scores and input notes using a MIDI keyboard or microphone. Up to 24 staves can be used in PrintMusic!.


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The text of The PrintMusic! is written for both the Macintosh and Windows editions of the Primer software. Separate instructions are given where commands and functions differ between operating systems. A consistent approach is taken to displaying these differences, so the reader is not distracted by the occasional separate image, or the more frequent differences between the Command (for Macintosh) and Ctrl (for Windows) key instructions.

The approach the author has taken is to introduce in a cohesive and logical way the many features and functions the user will need to prepare professional-looking musical scores. The book contains six chapters and as many appendices. Each chapter contains lots of screenshots, explanations of functions, bulleted lists, drills, and projects. Each of the chapters ends with a summary of what has been covered in that chapter and projects are provided based on this material. The drills are numbered step-by-step commands for completing a particular task, such as adding octave symbols to a score. Extra hints and information are also provided from time to time in outlined boxes, separate to the main text. The text is [End Page 93] aimed at beginner computer users, so terms like "wizard," "radio buttons," and "dialog box" are explained in chapter 1. The user is shown how to complete basic functions, such as opening the application and saving files, as well as learning about specific PrintMusic! features. As such, the book is mostly suited for use in a structured environment like a classroom/ lab, but would also be helpful for a self-directed new user. As the same main interface and note entry tools are used in all other Finale applications, this text can be used as a comprehensive tutor for PrintMusic! or as an introduction to the full-featured Finale application as well. Comparisons are occasionally made with other applications from the MakeMusic! notation range, where appropriate and informative, for example, to indicate the difference in the number of staves available to the user in each application.

The opening chapter of the book gives an overview of how to create new score files, view these scores, and save files. This continues into the following chapter when the user learns more about the main toolbars available and how to enter notes of various pitches and durations. The author does not overburden the user with information when presenting topics. Enough information is given to enable the user to complete a particular task and where appropriate it is indicated that certain topics will be covered more comprehensively in a later, more suitable, chapter. The book strongly suggests that the reader learn and use shortcut keys for many functions, and gives many tables and lists of such shortcuts. Occasionally, continuous pages of shortcuts are given and these can be overwhelming for the reader. Chapter 3 gets into more detail about the score and covers topics such as tuplets, accidentals, grace notes, beams, and slurs. The drills from the end of this chapter onwards are challenging to the user and really do test how much they have learned and...

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